Locrian scale on guitar

Its formula is R b2 b3 4 b5 b6 b7, the same in every key: learn it once and you can build the Locrian scale on any root. Players often use it for metal riffs.

A root on a black key goes by one name here: C# Locrian, never Db Locrian. To find each note on the neck on its own, see every note on the fretboard.

B Locrian is B Natural Minor with the 2 and the 5 lowered by a half step.

C and F are the notes that make the difference; on the neck above they wear a ring.

Nobody learns the whole neck at once. The Locrian scale comes in seven boxes with three notes on each string: position 1 starts on your low string with the root, B at fret 7, and each next box starts on the next note of the scale.

Learn one box, then the next, and play across both: together they cover the neck. Where the neck has room, a box comes back twelve frets higher. These are three-notes-per-string shapes, not CAGED.

In B, these are the chords that live in the Locrian scale: a triad and a seventh chord on each note of the scale, so you know what to play under your solo.

Click a chord to see how to play it.

Same notes, same frets, another home note: know the Locrian scale on the neck and you already have these under your fingers.

• C Ionian (Major)
• D Dorian
• E Phrygian
• F Lydian
• G Mixolydian
• A Aeolian (Natural Minor)

All seven modes side by side: guitar modes.

Tune down and the Locrian scale stays the same scale, it just sits on other frets. In Drop D only your low string changes, so every shape on the other five strings stays put. Drop C and Drop B take every string down, so the whole scale shifts, and DADGAD lowers three strings. Here is where its root B sits on the low string in each.